How did the Augustan Roman army replacement process work?

[chaplain118]

Posted on reddit, but might as well post here as well. Good to get perspective from multiple places.

Anyways:

I know that the Augustan age was one full of heavy-handed military tactics against the various tribes on the fringes of the empire (Cantabrian Wars, the Pannonian Revolt, Tiberius in Germania, etc.) With so many wars going on, there must have been a decent amount of effort that went into replacing soldiers.

Since only Roman citizens could join in the actual legions while peregrini joined as Auxilia, that meant the majority of the recruits/replacement to the legions had to be citizens. Conclusion was that they had to have come from Italy.

I've not read a lot of information on soldier replacement in the Augustan period, and whenever browsing for information on Roman army training, there's little mentioned about training the replacements.
So, can any historians here help me out?

EDIT: Reddit discussion http://www.reddit.com/r/ancientrome/...y_replacement/

[Grimbold]

On the Augustan era legions were recruited from Italy and Roman colonies, that or cities that were granted roman status.

[Alkarin]

Can you link the reddit threat aswell?


And I think hes asking about how they got reinforcements to the legions on the frontier and such. Not necessarily how they were recruited into the Army, but rather what was the method of refilling the depleted ranks.

[naq]

Sons of auxiliaries would become citizens, thus was able to join legions.

[Sertorio]

On the Augustan era legions were recruited from Italy and Roman colonies, that or cities that were granted roman status.

And I think hes asking about how they got reinforcements to the legions on the frontier and such. Not necessarily how they were recruited into the Army, but rather what was the method of refilling the depleted ranks.

Recruiting was probably made at province level, maybe by recruiting parties sent from the legions. After physical trials, recruits were sent to the units where they would be trained and where they would serve as legionairs.

[chaplain118]

Thanks for the responses, everyone.

@Setorio: yeah, it makes sense to recruit at a provincial level, but if I remember correctly, that didn't really start happening until permanent legion bases were established in the late first century AD to early second century AD for a few reasons.

1. The colonies established by Rome in the provinces during early Augustan reign were old veterans from the civil wars and were free from military service, making them an unlikely source of recruits.

2. Provinces tended to provide men for the Auxilia and not the proper legions.

3. Training as tirones of the Roman army must've happened elsewhere, as the new recruits, once inducted into the legions, would be expected to carry out all the duties of a Roman soldier (marching, pitching camp, construction, etc.). These were highly specialized labor that were expected to be known by the time a tiro made the transition to a miles. It makes little sense to throw new recruits directly in the army without preparing them as that would eat up precious manpower, especially during campaign season.

[Sertorio]

Permanent bases became active as the empire settled in fixed borders. Prior to that, a legion would probably build a winter camp at the end of the campaign season. I doubt that a legion would train new recruits while on campaign ( or at least the pressing need for that same untrained recruits to see active service, would severly reduce their life expectancy.).
On the other end, off-campainning, in winter quarter, or any other situation, new recruits could be trained to legion standards. Also lets not forget that Roman army always build camp, so there were always a place where these recruits could remain, even on campaign.
I have no idea if any structure resembling a modern boot camp ever existed, but there are records of recruits inscribed in centuries roosters wich seems to suport my idea of the recruit joining is training and service unit.